Language Gaffes

Adult learners of a foreign language all have stories of making embarrassing mistakes. Early on when I was studying some Mandarin, I meant to say, "Wo dudz e", which means, "My stomach is hungry", (or they way they would say the equivalent of "I'm hungry"). However, instead of the "dudz" I should have used (for "stomach"), I said "tudz", which means "rabbit". I wondered why the expressions on my host family's faces went blank, trying to figure out where I was keeping the fluffy little fellow, and precisiely how I would know that he was hungry!

Fast forward 27 years and many, many language blunders later (including a very serious one, which I'll share about in another post some time), I made a doozy last week in English class. I had shared a devotional with the students about how the encouragement we show to others can really impact the course of their lives for the better. I started to share a story about how my life had an impact on a young high school student in a grocery/produce store where we both worked. However, instead of saying chhiau-kip-chhī-tiû* for "supermarket", I just put the words for "vegetable" and "store" together: "chhài tiàm". Several of the students in the class started snickering. I immediately knew I had made a "linguistic misstep" and corrected myself.

Afterward, one of the older ladies in the class approached me and said I shouldn't tell people I used to work in a "chhài tiàm", as this was a euphemism in Taiwanese for a p*rnography store. Yikes! Won't make that mistake again!

My First (and possibly last) Attempt at Poetry

The following is a poem I wrote about life in a Taiwanese city (in free verse):

I am witness. Witness to a million lives, lived out in the routine, and sometimes not routine of life.
Air is thick, tensions thicker, behind walls in unseen rooms.
Voices, calm, laughing, shouting, angry. I am immersed.

Faces pass. All the same, all different. Eventually you see. Not all the same.
Emotions pushed deep, behind a mask, erupt from time to time. This is human, yes?
Cries, anguish, witness the suffering, both public and private.

Frenetic pace, yet a pure flow, like a river that turns it's course, winding, ever moving to it's place.
At any given time, I see any given picture. A snapshot; scenes that could be repeated a thousand times in other places, yet all within this pool.

Noise growing, steady, constant, then fading, to the rhythm of the orbit.
Heat and light, cold and dark, faces, lit from within. Faces, devoid of hope.
Friendship, relationship, love. How different we are, yet how similar.

Words fall like raindrops. Rippling in time, but without meaning, to me.
I get it, I understand, but miss the point. Is there some secret you're not telling me? Or am I just to thick, too "outside"?

A smile. Eyes connect with eyes. You know me. I know you. Thank-you. I am your guest. You are a gracious host. Can I offer you hope.....?

Where Did February Go?

I've tried to post on this blog every other week or so. Nothing that could be defined as "regular" by any means, but enough to keep followers interested and up to date with what's happening with us here in Taiwan. Somehow the whole month of February slipped by without a single post.

A highlight of the month was definitely the visit from one of my older sisters and her son. It's the first time family has come to visit us in Taiwan since we came back in 2006, and we had a great time. One week is just too short, though. But, we are thankful nonetheless. We did have a great time, and I'm hoping more family will come to visit before too long.

One of the things my sister and nephew and I did was to drive across the cross-island highway to the east coast. The mountains of Taiwan are so beautiful, and I seize every opportunity I have to get up to where it's cool, quiet, clear, and uncrowded - the total opposite of life in the city here.

My sister (Sandra) and nephew (Steven)